BHU comes up with ‘Mahamana Declarations’ to check Covid-19

Varanasi: To strenghten its fight against the Covid-19 pandemic, the Banaras Hindu University has come up with ‘Mahamana Declarations.’ A nine-member working group has also been constituted to oversee the implementation of the nine-point ‘Mahamana Declarations’ within the next 12 months.
“The Mahamana Declarations are the outputs from the recently held webinar on indigenous alternative medicine systems in India like ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (AYUSH) in fight against Corona virus globally,” said chairman of the committee and dean of the faculty of ayurveda Prof Yamini Bhushan Tripathi.
The six-day webinar was held from April 27 to May 2 by faculty of Ayurveda, IMS BHU, in association with the Patient Safety and Access Initiative of India Foundation (PSAIIF), Quality Council of India (QCI) and Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce & Industry (FICCI).
Other members of the panel include Dr Meenakshi Datta Ghosh, IAS Retd former secretary to the govt of India, Dr KK Aggarwal, former President IMA, headquarters, New Delhi, Prof Dr Tanuja Nesari, director All India Institute of AYUSH, New Delhi, Prafull D Sheth, former vice-president FIP, board member PSAIIF Vadodara Gujarat, Arvind Varchaswi MD Sri Sri Tattva, Bengaluru, Karnataka, Prof R N Acharya dean Gujarat Ayurveda University, Pantnagar, Gujarat, Prof Bejon Kumar Misra, adviser/consultant IMS, BHU and Prof Dr K N Dwivedi HoD Dravyaguna IMS BHU.
Prof Tripathi said that a special attention is needed on accessibility of indigenous alternative medicine systems AYUSH to lessen morbidity and mortality across the world. The declarations also took note of policy issues or legal instruments, such as the action plan for promotion and communication strategy for global partnership to provide credible options other than modern medicine.
According to Tripathi, the main points of the declarations include basic issues like at least 5% of the GDP should be invested into healthcare and substantial amountin preventive care by linking all the primary healthcare centres with AYUSH. The ministry of health & family welfare and ministry of Ayush (MoA) should jointly examine, revise and update specifications of plant materials, finished products and packaging materials regularly. . Clinical trials and experimental studies of ayuvedic medicines, procedures and recommendations should be speeded up .
All AYUSH practitioners, nurses other paramedics should sharpen their clinical skills, and treatment guidelines. “We should involve all Ayush doctors, nurses and paramedics working under all situations of health care. We also need to develop Ayurvedic/AYUSH protocol for treatment ,” he said. Besides, all existing helplines for farmers and citizens should be integrated with the National Medicinal Plant Board (NMPB) Govt. of India to help cultivation of medicinal plants. .
It is also recommended to establish a Center of Excellence in the form of National Institute of Ayurvedic Education and Research (NIEAR) at faculty of ayurveda at IMS, BHU.